This could be the year you have a world-class lawn — crisp emerald-green blades with not a dandelion or brown spot in sight. It’s not as tough to do this as you might assume. Lawn care is a method that begins in early spring and continues on into the fall, but it doesn’t have to take up a lot of your time.

One option for the lawn of your dreams is employing a landscaping service to prepare your lawn for seeding. They can do a spring cleanup and get rid of the fallen branches, leaves and winter debris, and aerate your ground. If you’re like most people, you believe lawn care starts with seeds, but it doesn’t. Your soil is densely packed after the snow and rains of the winter, and it requires aeration before anything else takes place. You could buy a consumer-grade aeration tool, however, you can generally have lawn care company do it for little more than the price of that tool.

Nevermind what kind of seed you’ve had in mind and seek advice from a lawn care specialist on the ideal grass for your environment and planned uses. If you have kids who’ll be erecting a volleyball net and playing in the yard all summer, you’ll want to pick a strong grass that can survive under those circumstances. Some sturdy lawns can be started with plugs of grass, as opposed to seeding. This approach can develop a healthy, quick-growing lawn, however you may choose to have a landscaping service do the back-breaking work.

The other thought when deciding on the kind of grass for your yard is your dedication to cutting and watering. If that’s not your preferred summer task, you could have a lawn service do it on a normal basis. Each variety of grass has its own growth rate and need for regular care. If you take pleasure in performing lawn work and watching your garden thrive, then you’ll be fine with a lawn that demands some upkeep. If you’d rather be out playing golf or indoors watching television, consider a lower maintenance grass that can deal with a bit of neglect without browning out or dying.

The ideal lawn starts with those three things: aeration, seeding and, later on, mowing. You can have the yard of your dreams this year, but spring is arriving and you should start planning now.